Tech

Why Is Mozilla Building a Mobile OS?

Mozilla's resigning CEO Gary Kovacs may be stepping down, but he's still passionate about transforming the mobile space and believes “the line between a browser, web page and an app should just go away."

Kovacs took the stage at All Things D’s Dive Into Mobile conference in New York City on Monday to explain why Firefox is building its own mobile operating system, especially in a space where upstart mobile OSes have trouble thriving, and to talk about his decision to leave Mozilla before the end of this year.

The key to understanding why phones bearing the Firefox OS will arrive in five European countries this summer is to look at where the next 2 billion mobile users will come from. As Kovacs sees it, those new mobile users are, in the next four-to-seven years, coming from the developing world, in places where the majority of the population is below the poverty line and doesn't have access to the same kind of powerful hardware found, for example, in the U.S.

Interestingly, despite the existence of hundreds of thousands of apps, Kovacs said there aren't enough to serve the needs of these markets. Part of the problem, noted Kovacs, is the closed development environments of iOS and Android (yes, Kovacs does not think Android is completely open —"There isn’t a standard toolset"). With Web-based Firefox mobile OS, Kovacs hopes to "open the ecosystem" and "spark innovation."

Kovacs didn't spend all his time pointing fingers at traditional mobile OS providers. There's good reason why mobile browsers are not the container for every mobile experience.

"Historically we [browser developers like Mozilla] have done a bad job. The browser was optimized for, over time, a growing screen." Kovacs says that needs to change. "Our best innovation is to take back and shrink it for these smaller devices. Someone will do an 'Apple' on the whole browsing experience and change the paradigm completely," said Kovacs.

Will It Work?

Kovacs also addressed a chief concern for its Web-based mobile OS. Yes, Kovacs, explained, the apps will be built in HTML and JavaScript, but they will all still work offline.

Facebook famously gave up trying to build its Facebook Mobile app in HTML and reverted to native mobile OS code. Kovacs insists the Web APIs are much better than they were two years ago and are completely ready to access low-level system functions (like camera, phone rotation, etc.).

As for partners, Kovacs expanded a bit on the Sprint partnership, confirming that Sprint is a Firefox OS partner and “has indicated a desire” to deliver the first U.S. handsets in 2014.

Why Go?

While Kovacs didn't share any details on his next job, he did explain why he's leaving right now, just as the non-profit Mozilla is about to enter a new mobile frontier.

"I learned in college, very early, you never want to stay at the party too long," said Kovacs, adding that he was brought in a few years ago as a "change agent."

Kovacs isn't going just yet, he's publicly stated that he'll exit when the first Firefox OS devices hit the European market this summer. As for where he's going, the former SAP mobile exec says he's heading "back to his roots."

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